Thread: McDonalds Beating

Originally Posted by greenhavoc

I hope your brain doesn't function like that all the time.

If a half dude walked in on you in the pisser you wouldn't think twice about it, right?
If you were a woman, though, and a half dude even hinted at coming into your pisser...

This "crime" has nothing to do with hate, hero.

Dear weirdoz,
What did you think would happen, you moron.

I can't believe that you're saying you think that many males wouldn't react badly to an obviously transsexual woman coming into the male toilets, to primp up her make-up and have a shit.

As an example for any ignorantly arrogant people like you, I, as a not-"half-dude" but someone who looks quite feminine, have had people irrationally call me a faggot and other unsavoury things when I've entered a bathroom. Wouldn't like to imagine what I'd have to deal with if I wore lipstick and a dress.

Originally Posted by Ne-yo

Call it whatever you want, come to this country and abuse a woman and I guarantee you that you'll get dealt with.

I don't hit women, but I beat bitches up.

Originally Posted by Jeff777

I'm not against capital punishment. In some instances, I think it's great. Therefore, I wouldn't consider it a "problem". Executing a devilish bastard sounds more like a solution from where I'm standing.

I think that would definitely be an easier option, and more just in some cases. BUT, it goes without saying that changing people is better than killing them. Problem is we can't force someone to change, they have to do that themselves.

Which is why I agree.

I don't ever think giving the state the power of capital punishment is smart... partly because of how horrific miscarriages of justice then are, but mainly because I just don't trust the state with that kind of power... the slippery slope to injustice and tyrrany is so much easier when you're already allowed to take somebody's life.

Originally Posted by ClouD

BUT, it goes without saying that changing people is better than killing them. Problem is we can't force someone to change, they have to do that themselves.

Yes changing is better than killing them, but I think most people don't know HOW to change.

Originally Posted by Majestic

Yes changing is better than killing them, but I think most people don't know HOW to change.

That's one reason why I would suggest subjecting criminals to psychiatric help and behavior modification services.

Originally Posted by MindGames

That's one reason why I would suggest subjecting criminals to psychiatric help and behavior modification services.

Who's going to pay for that?

Tax payers. We wouldn't even have to increase taxes, we just have to cut other related programs.

It'd be expensive, but it could at least be done for some convicts. We could take all the money we waste on the war on drugs and use it to try to help violent criminals, people who are actually a threat to society. We could also downsize the military a bit. And the government in general.

Without the current absurd policy on drugs the prison population would be reduced by 1/4, immediately. Crime would also decrease over time because of this because illegal drug trade would no longer fund gangs.

I don't think we can just switch right over and do that for all convicts, but we could gradually move towards a more sensible, compassionate and effective method of dealing with crime.

Makes more sense than me paying for other people's health-care.

Originally Posted by stonedape

Makes more sense than me paying for other people's health-care.

So if someone shoots someone else, you'd rather pay various therapists and psychologists to "rehabilitate" the shooter than pay for the other's treatment?

Wanting extreme and unproportionate punishments for crimes of ignorance, as disgusting as they may be, seems to me like an emotional response. Not a rational one.

Originally Posted by Spartiate

Who's going to pay for that?

Taxpayers, of course. We're already paying for prisoners' living expenses, which amount to upwards of 25k per year per prisoner. However it is feasible that we could simply make prisoners pay their own expenses via full time community service. It's better than keeping them locked up all day doing virtually nothing productive.

Aren't prisons in the USA more and more being privatized?

While privatized prisons have obvious flaws, I would guess that it would relief the tax payer?

Also - there is a lobby that would be very much against the psychiatric help idea...

Originally Posted by MindGames

Taxpayers, of course. We're already paying for prisoners' living expenses, which amount to upwards of 25k per year per prisoner. However it is feasible that we could simply make prisoners pay their own expenses via full time community service. It's better than keeping them locked up all day doing virtually nothing productive.

I'm considering alternatives to incarceration because you're right, it's expensive and unproductive. That being said, I think what you're proposing is even less affordable (do you know how much a shrink costs?), has no proven effectiveness and takes away incarceration's only advantage, segregating the offender from the normal civilian world for the duration of his sentence.

I would tend to lean towards shorter but harsher means of punishments.

Originally Posted by dajo

Also - there is a lobby that would be very much against the psychiatric help idea...

It certainly beats being someone's bitch.

Like I said, the prisoners could pay for it themselves through full time community service, and also the psychiatric treatments could be made optional. I can see how mandatory behavior modification would be unsettling for a lot of people. But it is essentially the same thing you get when you go to the therapist in real life.

Originally Posted by Spartiate

I'm considering alternatives to incarceration because you're right, it's expensive and unproductive. That being said, I think what you're proposing is even less affordable (do you know how much a shrink costs?), has no proven effectiveness and takes away incarceration's only advantage, segregating the offender from the normal civilian world for the duration of his sentence.

I would tend to lean towards shorter but harsher means of punishments.

Yes, it's quite expensive, but it's nothing prisoners couldn't work off. After all, they're doing virtually nothing for years on end. And I do agree that it would have to be subject to trial experiments to show that it has effectiveness. But if that does turn out to be successful, then it could be a significantly better paradigm change, in that it would reduce the amount of crimes in the future; thus costing us less money.

Oh, in response to the punishment for the crime, why not force them to do unpaid hard labor for a couple years? After all, we're going to have to find a replacement for all those immigrants sooner or later. The point is that we want to be progressive as a society, instead of the current cycle of crime, meaningless punishment, and release.

According to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) 7,225,800 people at yearend 2009 were on probation, in jail or prison, or on parole — about 3.1% of adults in the U.S. resident population.[7][4] 2,292,133 were incarcerated in U.S. prisons and jails at yearend 2009.[1][3][7][4]

I don't see how you can accommodate numbers like that.

(lol at BJS)

Originally Posted by Spartiate

I don't see how you can accommodate numbers like that.

(lol at BJS)

As stonedape already said, a quarter of those people are there for drugs (I think it's even more than a quarter, way more).
They don't need this treatment. So we can disregard them right away. We're talking about people who are violent towards others.

Originally Posted by spockman

Wanting extreme and unproportionate punishments for crimes of ignorance, as disgusting as they may be, seems to me like an emotional response. Not a rational one.

Rational thinking is founded on emotional morals.

In which universe?

Originally Posted by ClouD

Rational thinking is founded on emotional morals.

I see some value to this statement in that logical systems are all based on some core value and some people get to this value based on emotional morals. But otherwise I disagree. A logical system should have arguments building upon this core value without any interference. Ideally, when deciding something, a person can remove their identity from the logical process entirely. This includes removing emotions which just get in the way.

Originally Posted by spockman

I see some value to this statement in that logical systems are all based on some core value and some people get to this value based on emotional morals. But otherwise I disagree. A logical system should have arguments building upon this core value without any interference. Ideally, when deciding something, a person can remove their identity from the logical process entirely. This includes removing emotions which just get in the way.

How can arguments(ie. rationality) be built upon a core value without any interference from...the core value? Emotion is a clear factor in the building blocks of all core values. Even value itself is attributed with emotion as a factor.

What rational (essentially socially acceptable) decisions, are not based from sources which require emotional morals? I have not seen someone make a "rational" decision without emotional morals; if you have, please give an example. Examples for my point can be found simply by looking at an irrational decision.

Emotion cannot be removed from the equation. It is when there is a lack of balance between emotion and logic that irrational decisions are made (in societal eyes). It is not rational to disregard emotion entirely, because it is much of what "rational thinking" is built upon. It is also not rational to disregard logic entirely, obviously.

For a rational decision to be made it must conform with what is "rational", which is deemed by society. Society does not absolutely ignore emotions for the sake of logic, nor vice versa. If you are to say that what is rational is subjective ith each individual, I'd disagree with that only a [somewhat] objective comparison to the norm would be rational.

The core value may not be an emotional one. In the case of punishment for murder, the core value could be "Survival of the species" which would be set logically, regardless of how many emotions were attached to that concept.
Furthermore, one can make a rational decision, with emotional morals as a factor, without making an emotional decision. I do think that this would still be a rational decision, due to the consideration of the negative outcome that may come of ignoring these emotional factors. For instance, I may decide, rationally, to get my spouse (if I had one) a new dress, based on the knowledge that she will get all emotional and whiney, and this will have a negative impact on moral and therefore productivity in the household. This does not necessarily require that this is an emotional decision, even though it is, in fact, a decision based upon emotion.
Examples of rational decisions that are not based from sources which require emotional morals:
Eating - stemmed from the biological instinct for self preservation, and reproduction.
Working - stemmed from the bilogical instinct for self preservation, and reproduction.
Lovemaking - stemmed from the biological instinct for self preservation, and reproduction.
Building a house - stemmed from the biological instinct for self preservation, and reproduction.
Just about any other action that we perform - stemmed from the biological instinct for self preservation, and reproduction.

On the other hand, that leaves the question: What is the point of emotion? If it is not necessary, why do we possess this quality, along with many different species of animal?
Emotion could be that which makes these instinctual instructions work. Without emotion, we would still take these actions necessary for self preservation, and reproduction, but I think that it is possible that if it became difficult to perform these functions, we may give up too easily. We might accept death too easily. MAYBE.
It is also possible that even without emotions, the instructions for survival would be even stronger, for it would be all that we knew, and we would be unrestricted from the limitations caused by emotion.
I think it is possible that you can see the answer to this within nature. It seems that some creatures do not exibit any signs of emotion. Of course we cannot prove this.
Bees and ants gladly give up their life for the good of the pack. Do they do this out of love for the pack, or are they simply programmed to do this?

I think that most likely it is possible that emotion is a phenomenon that is created within pack animals, and is necessary for the survival of the pack. A pack that cares about one another should be stronger than a group of uncaring individuals that live in the same area. While emotion makes the rules of pack survival work better, I don't believe it is absolutely necessary for survival, and since almost any action we perform can be attributed to survival of the species, that encompasses most of the things we do.

Originally Posted by ClouD

How can arguments(ie. rationality) be built upon a core value without any interference from...the core value? Emotion is a clear factor in the building blocks of all core values. Even value itself is attributed with emotion as a factor.

What rational (essentially socially acceptable) decisions, are not based from sources which require emotional morals? I have not seen someone make a "rational" decision without emotional morals; if you have, please give an example. Examples for my point can be found simply by looking at an irrational decision.

Emotion cannot be removed from the equation. It is when there is a lack of balance between emotion and logic that irrational decisions are made (in societal eyes). It is not rational to disregard emotion entirely, because it is much of what "rational thinking" is built upon. It is also not rational to disregard logic entirely, obviously.

For a rational decision to be made it must conform with what is "rational", which is deemed by society. Society does not absolutely ignore emotions for the sake of logic, nor vice versa. If you are to say that what is rational is subjective ith each individual, I'd disagree with that only a [somewhat] objective comparison to the norm would be rational.

Have you read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance?

Originally Posted by Spartiate

So if someone shoots someone else, you'd rather pay various therapists and psychologists to "rehabilitate" the shooter than pay for the other's treatment?

I didn't exactly say that. In that case I would rather pay for the persons treatment. I was referring to this making more sense than me paying for people who don't take care of their health to be kept alive at 70.

I'm not completely against public healthcare, I just think that crime and education are more important issues. We need to fix the absolutely moronic way we have of doing things right now. Healthcare for all would be nice, but I don't think it's a necessity. Neither is rehabilitating prisoners. Reforming the current system is more important than that, but we could start moving things in that direction, even if we only did it for 1% of the prison population. We just generally need to start doing things in a way that doesn't reinforce the prisoner's already demented psychological state. By treating them like an enemy and locking them up in a rape room we just continue the cycle. If we are to better society we need to break it, otherwise we'll just continue in the same direction.

Originally Posted by stonedape

I didn't exactly say that. In that case I would rather pay for the persons treatment. I was referring to this making more sense than me paying for people who don't take care of their health to be kept alive at 70.

I'm not completely against public healthcare, I just think that crime and education are more important issues. We need to fix the absolutely moronic way we have of doing things right now. Healthcare for all would be nice, but I don't think it's a necessity.

Then public healthcare is not the problem. It's the fact that families are unwilling to let their family member die. It's a problem with people again, and the hospitals and the authorities who won't allow euthanasia.
Nothing is a necessity. But public healthcare allows the child with leukemia who has a poor family to get treatment by taking some money from people who have more money than them.

Originally Posted by sloth

Furthermore, one can make a rational decision, with emotional morals as a factor, without making an emotional decision. I do think that this would still be a rational decision, due to the consideration of the negative outcome that may come of ignoring these emotional factors. For instance, I may decide, rationally, to get my spouse (if I had one) a new dress, based on the knowledge that she will get all emotional and whiney, and this will have a negative impact on moral and therefore productivity in the household. This does not necessarily require that this is an emotional decision, even though it is, in fact, a decision based upon emotion.

emotional=whiney?
moral(e)=???

One should buy a wife a dress because one loves her and wants to do something special for her and show her how you feel. IF a man buys his wife a dress so she will shut up and stop bitching, this is not love, and not a happy marriage. Love is an emotion and is more important than this rationalization. What you are describing is a rationalization of an emotional decision. If you love her, you buy her a dress. If you don't love her rationally you would not buy her a dress so she will get fed up with you and leave and you can be free of this emotional whiney woman. I might be being facetious. But really, if you buy her a red dress to keep her from whining she will know, and not feel loved, and this rational decision will not reap the desired outcome.

Examples of rational decisions that are not based from sources which require emotional morals:
Eating - stemmed from the biological instinct for self preservation, and reproduction.
Working - stemmed from the bilogical instinct for self preservation, and reproduction.
Lovemaking - stemmed from the biological instinct for self preservation, and reproduction.
Building a house - stemmed from the biological instinct for self preservation, and reproduction.
Just about any other action that we perform - stemmed from the biological instinct for self preservation, and reproduction

.

Yes it is true that things we do have rational purposes, but that is not what motivates us. You are rationalizing again. We "decide" to eat because it hurts us not to and it gives us pleasure to eat. We seek pleasure and happiness and avoid pain and suffering and unhappiness. Instincts are what motivate us to survive. People don't rationally decide to make love, at least the ones who are good at it don't. People may rationally decide NOT to make love. Emotion is a necessary ingredient to good lovemaking. In fact, emotion has reached its highest evolution in humans. Humans can make love as an art for exalted pleasure. Without emotion human lovemaking is more like animals' as a release and personal gratification. Have you ever watched a monkey make love? It lasts about a second or two and then they are relieved. Then they don't cuddle or anything afterwards. Emotions in humans is what inspires artists and musicians. The arts and music is one of the top measures of a civilization. The choice to create a painting is not based on rationality unless you are Thomas Kinkade.
In life or death situations we don't have time to think rationally. If the situation necessitates immediate action, like fight or flight, we need to act on gut impulses. When you are driving and a car cuts you off and slams on its breaks you don't have time to rationally decide to slam on your brakes. Emotion is much more efficient. Rationality is for coming up with explanations, or making decisions when there is time to think rationally.

On the other hand, that leaves the question: What is the point of emotion? If it is not necessary, why do we possess this quality, along with many different species of animal?
Emotion could be that which makes these instinctual instructions work. Without emotion, we would still take these actions necessary for self preservation, and reproduction, but I think that it is possible that if it became difficult to perform these functions, we may give up too easily. We might accept death too easily. MAYBE

.

This is what I am talking about. Emotions are more powerful at motivating behavior than logic. Emotions don't "get in the way" of survival most of the time. The desire to live is an instinct, and it is emotionally based, not rationally based. Even someone with developmental disabilities who has no good genes to contribute to the gene pool still has a desire to live, which is not rational. Infertile people who are incapable of reproducing and who have no useful skills to contribute, still have a fear of death.

It is also possible that even without emotions, the instructions for survival would be even stronger, for it would be all that we knew, and we would be unrestricted from the limitations caused by emotion.
I think it is possible that you can see the answer to this within nature. It seems that some creatures do not exibit any signs of emotion. Of course we cannot prove this.
Bees and ants gladly give up their life for the good of the pack. Do they do this out of love for the pack, or are they simply programmed to do this?

We might not be able to recognize their emotions, but they do exist. Crocodiles have been shown to have emotions. I believe that emotions ARE the programming. I doubt that bees or ants are thinking rationally to give up their lives for the pack. I think that it is love for the queen.

I think that most likely it is possible that emotion is a phenomenon that is created within pack animals, and is necessary for the survival of the pack. A pack that cares about one another should be stronger than a group of uncaring individuals that live in the same area. While emotion makes the rules of pack survival work better, I don't believe it is absolutely necessary for survival, and since almost any action we perform can be attributed to survival of the species, that encompasses most of the things we do

Emotions are more developed in birds and most in mammals and mostly of all humans. Although I think that all animals have some degrees of emotions. But it reaches its highest development in order for child rearing and bonding in birds and mammals. Emotion is behind attraction. Even though logically we are attracted to mates that have desirable genes, it is an emotional response that we follow. It is our emotions that decide what genes are desirable.

I think that deifying rationality at the expense of emotionality is an error in judgement of priorities. Ideally, one should be very emotionally intelligent and balance that with a rationally trained intellect. The emotions are like the horses that draw the carriage, and the intellect should be the driver who holds the reins. The emotions only "get in the way" when the driver is gone or asleep or whatever. But without horses there is no inspiration or motivation to act. Logic can go in circles. If all we had was logic without emotions than what is the logic that humans should survive? Logically, humans are the greatest threat to life on this planet. And if there is no joy, no sadness, no emotions, what is the rationality behind why we should survive?

This is in defense of emotions. I am not attacking rationality. Both are needed, nature has done right to provide us with emotions. In fact, rationality seems to be not very much needed by nature to carry on life. Rationality is a gift unique to humans, at least in a significant amount. But it only seems to guide us rather than inspire us. But all too often people misuse rationality (also emotions). Too often a couple will fight, one partner will be frustrated because he or she will feel unheard and misunderstood while the other partner is saying "Calm down, be rational." Which only frustrates the first partner more, because emotions are important and in order for peace, we need understanding, in order for understanding, we need to acknowledge each other's emotions. Too often when someone is saying "be rational" they are really saying "don't be emotional". Of course, it is important to be able to see beyond personal emotions, but it is also important to take emotions into account on an equal basis.

BTW, this is interesting because I have seen so many people rationalize emotions but in this thread might be the first time I have seen someone emotionalize rationality. They are both interdependent in us humans.